The following discussion is an archived debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. The result of the discussion was Approved.

Operator: Erik9 (talk)

Automatic or Manually Assisted: Manually started, performs edits automatically.

Programming Language(s): Uses AWB with autosave function

Function Overview: Helps to enforce the source requirements of WP:BLP by adding Template:BLP probably unsourced to all articles in Category:Living people that match certain criteria which indicate a high probability that the articles are unsourced.

Edit period(s): continuous, as needed

Already has a bot flag (Y/N): Y

This task would add Template:BLP probably unsourced to articles meeting all of the following criteria:

1. Contains Category:Living people
2. Does contain any transclusions of template:unreferenced, template:BLP unsourced, or any redirects thereto
3. Does not contain any uses of <ref> tags
4. Does not contain any raw external links beginning with http://
5. Does not contain any transclusions of any template listed at Category:External link templates or any subcategory thereof
6. Does not contain the string "ISBN" (case sensitive)
7. Does not contain any section title beginning with "reference", "note", "external link", "source", "citation", or "bibliography"
8. Has never previously been edited by this bot for the purpose of adding Template:BLP probably unsourced, at the same article name

Discussion[edit]

Since this is an AWB run, could you run some bios manually, supervised, so we can look for false positives? – Quadell ^(talk) 17:47, 13 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

With the most recent revision of the AWB configuration, I used the pre-parse mode to determine which articles the bot would place template:BLP probably unsourced on. Out of 1573 articles processed, the following were identified as unsourced:

1. Joaquín Alonso
2. Minas Alozidis
3. Kjell Alseth
4. Jorge Altamira
5. Billy Alton
6. Taj Alvaranga
7. Sergio Álvarez Conde
8. Diego Álvarez
9. René Domingo Alvarez
10. Benjamin Alvaro
11. Addison Alves de Oliveira
12. Roberson de Arruda Alves
13. Pedro Amat
14. Felipe Enrique Amaya
15. Amit Jogi
16. Álvaro del Amo
17. Amr El-Daly
18. Martin Anastasi

which, from my examination, do not contain any false positives. Erik9 (talk) 01:37, 14 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• A very good idea to round all these articles up in a pen as a first step towards dealing with them. I'm concerned that there may be large numbers of uncited BLP articles in certain subject areas (e.g. sports figures, holders of various records, mayors of cities, etc.), particularly older ones written before we were as strict with respect to WP:V and WP:N. Do we really want to put the tag on all of them, or might that be handled better in some cases with a category, tag on the talk page, or coordination with the bio project to add an "uncited" parameter to the bio project tag? Wikidemon (talk) 01:16, 14 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

A prominent notice at the beginning of unsourced BLPs alerts as many editors as possible of the need for the following interventions to uphold the biographies of living persons policy:

1. Immediate removal of all controversial material
2. Immediate deletion, per CSD G10, of articles comprised only of controversial material, or which would be subject to speedy deletion for other reasons if the controversial material were removed (the classic example being "X is a criminal...")
3. Adding reliable sources to the article
4. Deletion of articles for which acceptable sources cannot be found despite adequate research, based on community consensus at AFD

These purposes are not adequately served by burying notices in the categories at the bottom of articles, or on the talk page in a template:WPBiography parameter, where they will only be seen by experienced editors, if they are looking for them. Erik9 (talk) 01:47, 14 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, we need to be serious about BLP. Older articles may potentially have held libel for longer periods of time, so they require more concern, not less. For instance, Amit Jogi has been around since mid-2006, and says he was "allegedly conspiring to murder Ram Avtar Jaggi" without a source. – Quadell ^(talk) 07:52, 14 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

 Approved. Since a test has, in effect, already been run, I'm sending this straight to "approved". – Quadell ^(talk) 20:24, 15 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.